Shoah Studies Program

In 2009, we started a Shoah Studies program which is a semester long program in which 40 students studied the history of the Jews in Poland before, during and after the shoah. The 2009 program included the following guest speakers: Rabbi Boaz Pash of Cracow, Mr. Simha Rotem - a survivor of the Warsaw ghetto uprising, Ms Daniela Malec - former head of the jewish student group in Cracow. The students study the history of the Jews in Poland for an entire semester. We cover the whole 800 years of the Jewish presence in Poland, covering the history of the yeshivot, the halachic authorities, the hassidim and the mitnagdim, the haskala, the zionists, the bundists, the yiddish writers, etc. Using Polish Jewry as a paradigm so that when we reach the discussion of the Shoah, the immensity of the tragedy is better understood. From this group, 20 attended the Poland trip in the summer.

 

Touching People

The program includes an element of outreach as well, in which a group of 15 students meet with shoah survivors to document their stories. This program which started in December 2009 is in conjuction with the Ohel Nehama synagogue in Jerusalem which has a golden agers Jewish identity program led by Dr. Fred Cisel.